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[0:00] The Lord said to Samuel, How long will you grieve over Saul, since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons.

[0:15] And Samuel said, How can I go? If Saul hears it, he will kill me. And the Lord said, Take a heifer with you and say, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord. And invite Jesse to the sacrifice, and I will show you what you shall do, and you shall anoint for me him whom I declare to you.

[0:34] Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him, trembling, and said, Do you come peaceably? And he said, Peaceably, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord.

[0:47] Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. And he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. When they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, Surely the Lord's anointed is before me.

[1:00] But the Lord said to Samuel, Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him, for the Lord sees not as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.

[1:14] Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel. And he said, Neither has the Lord chosen this one. Then Jesse made Shammah pass by, and he said, Neither has the Lord chosen this one.

[1:26] And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel. And Samuel said to Jesse, The Lord has not chosen these. Then Samuel said to Jesse, Are all your sons here?

[1:38] And he said, There remains yet the youngest, but behold, he is keeping the sheep. And Samuel said to Jesse, Send and get him, for we will not sit down till he comes. And he sent and brought him in.

[1:51] Now he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. And the Lord said, Arise, anoint him, for this is he. Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers.

[2:03] And the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah. Now the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him.

[2:17] And Saul's servants said to him, Behold now, an evil spirit from God is tormenting you. Let our Lord now command your servants who are before you to seek out a man who is skillful in playing the liar.

[2:28] And when the evil spirit from God is upon you, he will play it, and you will be well. So Saul said to his servants, Provide for me a man who can play well and bring him to me.

[2:40] One of the young men answered, Behold, I have seen a son of Jesse, the Bethlehemite, who is skillful in playing, a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence, and the Lord is with him.

[2:53] Therefore Saul sent messengers to Jesse and said, Send me David, your son, who is with the sheep. And Jesse took a donkey laden with bread and a skin of wine and a young goat and sent them by David, his son, to Saul.

[3:08] And David came to Saul and entered his service, and Saul loved him greatly, and he became his armor-bearer. And Saul sent to Jesse, saying, Let David remain in my service, for he has found favor in my sight.

[3:21] And whenever the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, David took the lyre and played it with his hand. So Saul was refreshed and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

[3:33] This is the word of the Lord. Amen. Please be seated. Good afternoon.

[3:46] It's good to see you here at our service zone this afternoon. Join me in prayer, would you please? Lord, we bless your name and honor you. Thank you for this opportunity to be before your people and with your people.

[4:00] Pray that together your word would minister to us, transform us, conform us into your likeness, and a servant that will please you well.

[4:12] We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. In 1 Samuel chapter 16, we're introduced to one of the most familiar and interesting characters on the pages of Scripture.

[4:28] We simply know him as David. And his legacy lives on with us today. There are several labels, and I'm sure that many of you are familiar with those labels, that have grown to stick with David.

[4:46] He's a giant killer. We'll look at that one next week. The sweet psalmist of Israel. Shepherd or leader of the sheep as well as leader of people.

[4:58] David was as adept at war as he was at worship. That's a part of his resume, his profile.

[5:09] He was a poet. He was a musician. He was a worship leader par excellence. The most beloved of Israel's kings.

[5:20] As a matter of fact, he became the standard. Either they were like or did not do like David did. And he is the person who is uniquely labeled in Scripture as a man after God's own heart.

[5:37] I think we'll gain a better understanding today of what that actually means. Some things you need to know. You already know them. About this biblical luminary.

[5:49] While he was a man of deep faith, he also was a man of the flesh. Guilty of adultery. Guilty of murder.

[6:02] A less than best or ideal father. However, next to Abraham, who was the father of the Jewish nation, No person ranks higher in the minds of those who have descended from Abraham than the person of David.

[6:23] Summertime here. It's travel time, isn't it? And in this particular sermon series, you and I get to travel with David over the next ten weeks.

[6:34] Sometimes David goes and we will go with him to places that we really would not rather go. But our prayer today is that each of us would journey in faith and that we would grow and learn together and be better equipped for life and mission by reason of the series that we're entering into today.

[6:57] I want you to see several things in the text. If you are opening to it, 1 Samuel chapter 16, verse 1. The first thing I want you to see is the rejection of a king.

[7:11] The next thing I want you to see is the selection of a king. And then finally, I want you to see the reflection of an even greater king that we see in the life of David.

[7:28] Notice the first part of verse 1. The Lord said to Samuel, how long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel?

[7:42] We are face to face here with a grieving prophet. And perhaps you remember him from last summer. He was the faithful judge slash prophet, sometimes priest, who had led the nation for decades.

[7:58] And here we find him grieving. He's grieving over Saul, the first king, who had demonstrated that he was unfit for the kingship, unfit for the leadership of God's people.

[8:14] 1 Samuel chapter 13, verses 8 through 15. Saul had acted foolishly, presuming the role of a priest. And this pattern, unfortunately, of Saul, it continued so that we see what we observe in 1 Samuel chapter 15 and verse 10.

[8:33] And I want you just to look there with me, would you please? 1 Samuel chapter 15 and verse 10. The word of the Lord came to Samuel.

[8:45] I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments. And notice, and Samuel was angry and he cried all night, cried to the Lord all night.

[9:03] Just get the picture of that. Here's a grieved servant of God. He was the one who had heeded the people's plea to give him a king. And then the king, in a sense, had bombed on them.

[9:17] Look at verse 17 of that same chapter. And Samuel said, Though you were little in your own eyes, and he's speaking to Saul, Are you not the head of the tribes of Israel?

[9:30] The Lord anointed you king over Israel. And the Lord sent you on a mission and said, Go devote the destruction of sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are consumed.

[9:42] Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you pounce on the spoil and do what was evil in the sight of the Lord? And Saul said to Samuel, I've obeyed the voice of the Lord.

[9:55] I've gone on a mission on which the Lord sent me. I've brought Agag, the king of Amalek, and I have devoted the Amalekites to destruction. But the people took of the spoil and sheep and oxen, the best of the things devoted to destruction, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.

[10:14] And notice what Samuel says. And Samuel said, Has the Lord as great a delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord?

[10:29] Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen, to hearken, is better than the fatter rams. Look at verse 23. For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption as iniquity and idolatry.

[10:45] Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king. The rejection of a king. Two times that word is used in verse 23, and also two times in verse 26.

[11:03] The same word appears in chapter 16, verse 1, and in chapter 16, verse 7. Samuel's grieving because Saul, the anointed king, the one who was appointed to represent God's interest on the earth, had dishonored the Lord.

[11:22] Again, the one he was supposed to be representing through the kingship, he had dishonored him through his disobedience. The rejection of a king.

[11:34] In the first part of that verse. But look at the next part of verse 16. Notice what the Lord tells Samuel to do. Fill your horn with oil and gold.

[11:47] I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons. A king rejected.

[12:00] A king selected from the house of Jesse. I want you to see here, this is something that is very important.

[12:11] Because what you have here is a divine initiative. God is on the move. And notice what I'm saying about that. The people had come to Samuel in chapter 8, and asked for a king.

[12:28] Here, in this verse, the Lord comes to Samuel and sent him with a horn in his hand, with oil in the horn, in order to anoint a king for him.

[12:41] It was a divine initiative. God on the move to select a king for himself. The Lord had provided himself a king among Jesse's sons.

[12:55] Now look, the word provided for is quite interesting. It is a key word in the chapter. It's the Hebrew root, or the form of the word, appears actually seven times in this chapter.

[13:10] We see it in verse 17, chapter 16, verse 17. Also, there it's translated provide. In verse 6, the same word is translated looked upon.

[13:21] It appears three times in verse 7, as sees or looks. And the word seen, same word, slightly different translation, is seen in verse 18.

[13:33] What are we talking about here? Particularly in verse 7, both the sight and the selection of God clashes with the sight and the selection of man.

[13:46] I believe the author really wants us to see that in this text. Go to Bethlehem, Samuel. There was a slight problem with that, wasn't it, as we look at verse 2.

[13:57] Because there had been this clash between Saul and Samuel, and they had parted ways. But go to Bethlehem. The last time that Saul and Samuel were together, it had not gone so well.

[14:10] You see that in chapter 15. And so Samuel was quite fearful in going to Jesse's house. But nonetheless, in spite of his fear, in spite of his anxiety, he went anyway.

[14:23] He goes, he comes peaceably to the city. And then he goes and he establishes or has this feast, and he invites the elders of the city there, but he also invites Jesse and his sons to come because God has already spoken to him.

[14:40] He's going to provide for himself a king in the house of Jesse. As we look on down, and we're skipping a little bit here, but as we look on down and see in verses 6 through 13, we see there the Lord's choice.

[14:55] Given what we know of the anointing of Saul, and that he was head and shoulders above the people, notice in verse 6 there, when they came, he looked on Eliab.

[15:06] And again, he's making, he's looking for God's king in Jesse's house. Eliab comes before him. And he was somewhat Saul-like. As a matter of fact, look what the verse says.

[15:18] Surely the Lord's anointed is before him. Could have been because of his appearance, of his height, of his stature. But notice what the Lord tells him in verse 7. One of these great, great verses.

[15:30] Perhaps some of you have memorized it. Do not look on his appearance, or on the height of his stature. Because I, and there's our word again, I have rejected him.

[15:41] For the Lord sees not as a man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. Don't look at his appearance.

[15:52] Don't look on it how tall he is. Man looks on the outward appearance, but check this out. Listen to this. The Lord's selection here was one according to his heart.

[16:08] It was according to his heart, or the Lord's heart. John Woodhouse helps us to see that according to the Lord's heart seems to be the best way to interpret this particular verse.

[16:23] And here's the idea. Here's the deal. Verse 7 is more about the sovereignty of God than it is the integrity of man.

[16:35] It's more about the heart of God than it is about the heart of a man. David was a man of God's choosing.

[16:46] He was a different kind of king in that he was sovereignly chosen by God. He was elected and selected by God himself. He was a man according to God's heart.

[17:02] And of course, David hadn't come on the scene yet, but that was the deal. One by one, Jesse's sons came before the prophet, came before the judge Samuel, and they did not pass the test.

[17:16] The Lord Samuel inquired a little further and found out that there was one more. He was the youngest. He was out doing chores, taking care of the chores, perhaps. I mean, why invite?

[17:28] Who would have thought to invite David? He was a young person, red hair, fair complexion, and sort of made him stand it on that day. When I think of David, I think, Grant, I think of you.

[17:41] He was sort of prippy, you know. You know, sharp, sharp kid. But again, he didn't measure up quite yet. He wasn't at the initial meeting, but he got in the room, huh?

[17:58] The youngest, the one with the least of years and the experience and maturity. Surprise! He's the one! The least likely person was the one that, again, the Lord chose based on his sovereign election, based on his sovereign choice.

[18:20] Anointing, Samuel! Because that guy, that is my king. That's the one that I want.

[18:30] That's the one that I'm selecting to do my beatings. And I will anoint him. And I will use him mightily and powerfully. That's my king.

[18:42] While those who were there who witnessed what had happened at Bethlehem, they did not know what was going on. They knew that something special was happening, but Samuel was the one who had the inside information.

[18:55] And the youngest of Jesse's sons was God's choice. Can you imagine Samuel with horn in hand raising it?

[19:08] And the oil begins to drip on that little young lad, huh? But as that happens, look at verse 10. Something even more special happened.

[19:20] God's spirit according to verse 13, then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the spirit of the Lord rushed, huh?

[19:31] Rushed upon David from that day, notice, from that day forward. And Samuel rose and went to Ramah, huh? Here, the rushing of the spirit of God, we've seen it on Samson, we've seen it in Saul, huh?

[19:47] Here was the presence and the power of the spirit of God. And this was the affirmation that David was indeed the very choice of God.

[19:58] And this presence of the spirit of God was God's power on David for the leadership role that he had chosen and anointed him for. And it goes on him from that day forward, huh?

[20:13] While the spirit of God rushed upon David, then the very next verse, we know that God's spirit departed from Saul. And a harmful spirit from the Lord troubles him.

[20:26] What's going on there? While in verses 1-13, we have both the rejection of a king and the selection of a king, in verses 14-23, we see evidences of Saul's rejection and of David's selection.

[20:45] David here was equipped for his God-appointed role as king. But Saul had forfeited the blessings and the spiritual provision that went along with being God's anointed.

[20:57] It's gone. No more. Huh? Notice the progression in Saul's life. Samuel, God's servant, is now gone.

[21:09] Huh? And here, God's spirit abandons, listen to this, I think this is very, we must learn this, God's spirit, huh?

[21:20] He abandons the one who rejected God. Dangerous thing to reject God. And yes, we are God's children. It's a new day. Huh? We have the spirit of God.

[21:31] He will never leave us and forsake us. But, sometimes we can get out from under the protection of God and different things will come upon us because of our disobedience and obstinance to the Lord.

[21:48] Huh? The departure of God's spirit and the presence of a harmful spirit from the Lord were evidences of God's rejection for Saul.

[21:59] Huh? So, what we see here continues what we've already seen. Saul has been dismantled of his kingship and with, and God's protection that went along with that.

[22:13] He's vulnerable. He's stripped. There's a sense of nakedness and vulnerability and helplessness that has gripped him. And here it is, friends, that we get a sneak preview here early in the David narrative.

[22:28] Huh? We see a sneak preview of what's going to happen to Saul during the rest of his life. We get a sneak preview of God abandoning him and this sort of strange dynamic, this spiritual harm, this harmful spirit from the Lord and how it interacted with him.

[22:49] Huh? While we see the evidences of Saul's rejection, we also see evidences of God's selection of David. Huh? The one that the Lord, and this is very ironic, and you see this in verse 1, but look at verse 17 with me.

[23:04] For so Saul said to his servants, notice this, here's the same word that we saw in chapter 16, verse 1, provide for me a man who can play well and bring him to me.

[23:16] Huh? Same word. Ironically, the one that the Lord has provided for himself is the same one that has been provided for Saul.

[23:28] God had provided David for himself, and then David goes into the court of the king was provided for David, I mean, for Saul in his court.

[23:40] In verse 18, look at the profile of the Lord's anointed that we see there in that particular verse. Let me just read it for you. One of the young men answered, Behold, I've seen a son of Jesse, the Bethlehemite, who is skillful in playing, a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence, and the Lord is with him.

[24:00] Now, we need to hear this. There is a time lapse. Don't know exactly how much time has lapsed between verses 1 through 13 and verses 14 through 23.

[24:11] Not only that, there is a good reason to believe that what we see in verses 14 through 23 actually takes place after the events of chapter 17 because we see this more full-blown profile of David here.

[24:27] We don't, we hadn't seen him yet as a man of valor, a man of war. So, again, it seems like for authorial purposes, for the writer's purposes, he places this here and I believe he places it here so we can see evidences of the Lord's rejection of Saul but evidence of God's selection of David.

[24:49] Because in verse 18 we see an older, more proven David and he's described as being musically skillful and he possesses, notice there, the characteristics of a good leader.

[25:04] He speaks well. He has a good presence and all of those, what we see there, he's a man of valor, he's a man of war. Those are characteristics of good leadership. But most importantly, we see there at the end that the Lord is with him.

[25:20] Evidence of the Lord's selection. Just like we see this cameo, this snapshot of Saul that previews what we will see of him in the rest of the book, even so with David, this little snapshot, this little cameo gives us, it sort of sneak previews what we're going to see of David even in the rest of the book.

[25:43] Saul was troubled, disturbed, unstable because of a harmful spirit from God. A full explanation of that may elude us but the theological reasons for this are clear.

[25:58] It's from God. Huh? The Lord gave, it was God allowed and it was God ordained and the Lord gave relief through the one that he had chosen, his chosen king.

[26:12] Let me give you several reminders, good reminders, I believe, from this text before I make the connection with reflections of David as it relates to our Lord.

[26:25] Listen to this. Externals can deceive us. Be cautious, friends, about evaluation based only on what you see.

[26:41] Huh? A charming personality, a juicy contract, a job offer that promises great things.

[26:52] Huh? I think of the movie The Firm. You remember Mitch, fresh out of law school, signed on to this law firm and he got more than he bargained for.

[27:05] Friends, bigger, taller, more bulky, I was going to say something else, but more bulky is not always the best thing.

[27:16] Huh? It's not better. There's more to see than what we actually see with our eyes. Huh? My prayer is that you and I would prayerfully line up our perspectives and our choices with the Lord's according to the Lord's heart, seeking to understand what that is and preference than our eyes.

[27:41] Huh? Let's strive to view things and to see things according to God's heart, not according to our sight. There's a second thing. Not only will externals deceive us, disobedience will ruin us.

[27:55] It can do us great, great harm. Huh? It can take us, friends, to places that we would rather not go. Huh? And from those places we're lost and wandering and it's hard to find your way back home and sometimes going on that trail of disobedience, we will never find our way back home.

[28:22] Huh? Disobedience can ruin us. Huh? Sometimes we get caught on the wrong side of the center line. We swerve over and we think we're going to get back but sometimes we never, never make it.

[28:37] And the consequences to our lives and to our families can be sheer devastation because disobedience can ruin us. Beware of rejecting God's word.

[28:51] You cannot do so without consequences. Huh? The third thing is this, God's provisions for God's assignments.

[29:02] We see that in the text, don't we? Verse 13. The passage reminds us that God through His Spirit empowers us for service. He did that for David in a very unique way because he was the Lord's anointed.

[29:15] He was the Lord's representative to the nation on earth and he was supposed to do God's bidding and represent, accurately represent God's interest on earth to the nation.

[29:25] Huh? David's anointing was unique. It was the anointing for a king. Whatever the Lord wants to do today, He empowers and He equips the body, the saints of God through His Spirit for particular and specific kind of tasks that are just right for you and me.

[29:45] As every man, 1 Peter chapter 4 verse 11, has received the gift, even so ministered the same one to another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

[29:56] Huh? We want to steward and treasure what God has given us but we also want to share and we can do so, friends, by the power of the Holy Spirit. Huh?

[30:06] The Lord's enablement goes with His assignments and then, huh? Oh, I love this particular chapter in that we see the musical skill of David.

[30:19] Be reminded of ways that the Lord can use us and also be reminded of the ways He can minister to us. Here's the deal.

[30:30] Next week, we'll get to see David with a sling but here, he is playing on a stringed instrument. That's what's in his hand in this text. And here, we come face to face with the marvelous power of music done well.

[30:48] It's one of the media that the Lord has used marvelously throughout history. Huh? He has others, other kinds of media that He uses and through them He can bring relief various kinds of ways.

[31:05] Don't underestimate the power of what the Lord has given you for the good of other people. Particularly, those of you who are gifted artists or artists in process.

[31:17] What are you doing with your music? What are you doing with your art? Several months ago, a musician friend of mine accompanied me to the nursing home that I go to on a weekly basis and there use this gift to refresh the people that were there and they indeed will refresh.

[31:36] What has God given to you that you might steward well skillfully, wonderfully for the glory and honor of God? Huh?

[31:47] The rejection of the king, of a king, the selection of a king. And I close on this afternoon with reflections of the king to come.

[31:58] Huh? The Lord Jesus Christ, of course. The king the Lord provided for his people in today's text was a reflection of the king who was to come.

[32:09] Even Jesus, our Lord, the king that the Lord God has provided for us. You say, how so? What we see here in the life of David points, friends, to the greatest of all kings, the Lord Jesus Christ himself.

[32:26] What's that? How so, Pastor Jay? The journey began in Bethlehem and so did the journey for Jesus, Micah 5 and 2 and thou, Bethlehem Ephrathah, you're not the smallest or least among the clans for out of you shall come the one who shall come from eternity.

[32:49] Huh? Like David, Jesus, who hailed from Galilee and Galilee was that off the beaten path, off the beaten path up in northern Palestine.

[33:01] Jesus, coming from Galilee, was an unlikely king. But guess what the Lord would say just like he said to David? That's my king. Huh?

[33:12] That's him. That's my king. Huh? As the Spirit of God rushed on David in verse 13, so the Spirit of God at Jesus' baptism would come upon him. Huh?

[33:22] John bore witness with the following words, I saw the Spirit descend from heaven like a dove. And check this out, just like with David, it remained on him, John chapter 1 verse 32.

[33:34] Peter would also say in Acts chapter 10 verse 38, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed of the devil.

[33:46] For God was with him. Luke chapter 4, the Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor, to proclaim the gospel to set at liberty those that are bruised, huh? To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, huh?

[33:59] Just like David, huh? And then like David, our Lord was the shepherd, the great shepherd of the sheep, was he not? In Matthew chapter 9, Jesus with compassion, looking out on the multitudes, and he tells his disciples, pray the Lord of the harvest, that he would send laborers into the harvest for the sheep, huh?

[34:22] Hebrews chapter 13 reminds us that he is that great shepherd of the sheep. What are you saying? What we see in David, the selected king, it reflects what we see in the king, Jesus Christ.

[34:36] And my prayer today, friends, is that he is your king, that you would love him, that you would serve him. He's the king that the Lord has provided for us, and we're about to come to the table and celebrate and receive and be strengthened what he has done for us through his saving work and his saving death.

[35:00] He's provided a king for us who had suffered and paid the ultimate price for us. So as we prepare to come, let me read the words of institution, and I want you to prepare yourself as we come and partake of these symbols that speak of the body of Jesus and the blood of Jesus.

[35:30] These are gospel symbols, Paul reminds us, we proclaim through the observance of this meal, the Lord's death until he comes. And so, let me ask you, even as you come, if you have been living in rebellion and disobedience, perhaps this day, as you prepare yourself to come to the Lord's table, it would be a day of turning for you, a day of returning back where you need to be, a day of repentance, returning unto him.

[36:11] May you resolve in coming today to try to understand the Lord's heart and to evaluate based on that perspective to the end that we can understand it and certainly he reveals his heart through his word.

[36:32] Commit yourself anew and afresh to that. Listen to the words of institution. For I receive from the Lord what I also deliver to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread.

[36:45] When he had given thanks, he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. in the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood.

[37:05] Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. Huh? Our king was a suffering king and the suffering was for us. And I invite you as I pray to prepare yourself and Steve is going to come and help me to serve on this afternoon.

[37:22] Shall we pray? Heavenly Father, thank you for these reflections of our Christ. And we know him as, yes, a suffering king, a sacrificial king.

[37:39] And we come even to him because we have come. And we come, Lord, honoring and celebrating what you've done for us. We come in obedience to you.

[37:52] May your people be strengthened. Lord, you know those on the edge. Oh, God, pray that you would bring them back. Bring them back from disobedience. Bring them back from rebellion.

[38:04]  Oh, God, and may they be strengthened in you this day, even as we come to your table.